G is for ground truth
The radar is a tremendous tool for seeing what is going on in the atmosphere, but it cannot tell us for sure what is going on in the ground. This is what the spotters do for us—get us the ground-truth information. – Howard Waldron In 2008, I will seek out …
H is for human rights
Most people, no doubt, when they espouse human rights, make their own mental reservations about the proper application of the word ‘human.’ –Suzanne LaFollette In 2008, I will fight for the rights of human beings I see being dismissed and excluded and not listened to. And killed for who they …
I is for inside looking
Man need only divert his attention from searching for the solution to external questions and pose the one, true inner question of how he should lead his life, and all the external questions will be resolved in the best possible way. – Leo Tolstoy In 2008, I will end each …
J is for jijnasu
Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. -Carl Sagan In 2008, I want to be a jijnasu, a seeker of wisdom, an inquirer. When I was preparing to talk with Billy Collins the other day (doesn’t that sound casual?), Mr Brilliant was holding the paper bag while I hyperventilated, …
V is for vegan revisited
Day three of vegan. If you’d like to follow along on my happy adventure, I’ll be documenting my year of living veganously here.
K is for kula
Life is the first gift, love is the second, and understanding the third. –Marge Piercy "When attention is directed onto an object, it remains in the object. Throughout the mystery of Kula, trading the mwali and soulava became ‘living personalities’ with definite cultural identities." – John Kasaipwalova Kula is a …
L is for love
All you need is love. Love is all you need. –The Beatles In 2008, I am going to simply open my heart. I have learned much about life from two women. The first was Meta, a young woman who died on September 14, 2006, in a tragic accident. She was …
This January First, invent the reality of your world
from “January First” The year’s doors open like those of language, toward the unknown. Last night you told me: tomorrow we shall have to think up signs, sketch a landscape, fabricate a plan on the double page of day and paper. Tomorrow, we shall have …
Our unfinished masterpiece, our incompleteness theorem
There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning. –Louis L’Amour In 1927, mathematician David Hilbert put the capstone on mathematics. Mathematics was done, he asserted in his proof theory. Less than five years later, in 1931, Kurt Gödel developed the incompleteness theorem, …
M is for Mission
Here is the test to find whether your mission on earth is finished. If you’re alive, it isn’t. -Richard Bach In 2008, I will stride confidently toward my mission—that thing that fills me with enthusiasm and a burning desire to get to work on it. This may or may not …
